Identity Politics Thrives on Division

A Nation Divided By Identity Politics

8/25/2017 - Suzanne Fields Townhall.com

Every generation has its own axes to grind, attitudes to assume and enemies to attack. It's the way the young move into maturity, sometimes with smarts and sometimes without. Every generation wants to make the world over in its own image.

Action and reaction can be creative as well as destructive, but the rhetoric of a generation often overstates what it's for and what it's against, galvanizing each side to take issue with the other. We called the generation that survived the Great Depression to fight and win World War II "the greatest generation" because good and evil were so clear-cut and, as British Prime Minister Winston Churchill put it in his tribute to the Royal Air Force during the Battle of Britain, "never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."

Leaders then were not perfect, but they had the intellect, information and passion for the good fight and could galvanize the home front. The newspapers, newsreels (television was hardly a gleam in anybody's eye) and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's fireside chats on the radio soothed rational fears and stoked public confidence.

Now we're embroiled in domestic wars of a different kind, and the younger generations challenge democracy from within. They even march against free speech, making the protection of the fragile First Amendment ever more difficult. President Donald Trump does not have the gift of reassurance required for uniting people. His initial remarks about the conflict in Charlottesville, Virginia, though distorted by the media, deepened alienation even after he corrected course with firm condemnations of hatred, bigotry and violence.

Identity politics thrives on division, and the president has become the icon of a divided nation. These divisions became clear in the 2016 election campaign as Trump mocked the elites and Hillary Clinton scorned the "deplorables." Both jeered with a sneer, appealing to a low common denominator of resentment.

Democrats had designated minorities and women as victims, and as Harvey Mansfield observes in Commentary Magazine, no Republican except Trump could exploit the weakness and absurdities of political correctness with the labels he put on the Democrats' designated constituencies for special favor in awarding jobs, honors and benefits.

"Without saying so -- for in this Trump was cautious and prudent -- he began to mobilize a white community to match the long-existing 'black community,' thus turning the strategy of identity against itself," Mansfield writes. "It was now Trump voters who were encouraged to think themselves marginalized."

Clinton's tin ear sealed her doom. Speaking at a town hall in Columbus, Ohio, she thrust her knife deep into miners' hearts. "We're going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business," she said. She later apologized to the miners who had already taken her measure. Her cold insensitivity became emblematic of Democratic identity politics and extended beyond the miners to all those who had lost their jobs when factories fled in hot pursuit of cheap labor abroad. Her tin ear recalled in paraphrase Shylock's speech in the "The Merchant of Venice," only with the word "Jew" replaced by the word "worker." Those in the Rust Belt who tipped the election could say, "If you prick us, do we not bleed?"

Trump exploited and exaggerated to great effect the newly perceived victims with the implication that many of these men and women, mostly white, were punished just as blacks were punished by racism. This was hardly more egregious than Clinton's radical feminists claiming moral equivalence with victimized blacks -- prosperous middle-class women demanding "liberation" from what seemed to the Rust Belt to be a pretty good life. Even the Donald's vulgarity and indecent insults sounded to many as merely "telling it like it is."

The endless war in Afghanistan does not have the moral clarity of World War II, when everything here as well as there was at stake. The president eloquently made the case this week that "a hasty withdrawal would create a vacuum for terrorists, including ISIS and al Qaeda." It was a useful reminder to all that "a wound inflicted upon a single member of our community is a wound inflicted upon us all," and that "When one part of America hurts, we all hurt."

He offered a deeply moving prescription for dissolving that hurt. "Let us make a simple promise to the men and women we ask to fight in our name, that when they return home from battle, they will find a country that has renewed the sacred bonds of love and loyalty that unite us together as one," he said.

That's an unaccustomed idealism coming from Donald Trump, a man of erratic temperament who rarely shows such introspection or invokes the grander emotions. But it's a worthy invocation nonetheless from the president of the United States.

Mr. President - A Promise is A Promise!

Mr. President: No DACA, Build The Wall, or No Deal at All!

12/30/2017 - Arthur Schaper Townhall.com

President Trump’s signature phrase as a Reality TV host was “You’re Fired.” This weekend, he sounded more like Howie Mandel with “Deal or No Deal?”, after he tweeted about a DACA fix--Democrats they must support the wall. I say “No deal at all” if it includes amnesty for the wall.

President Trump has fulfilled one promise after another. He has deregulated the economy. He has opened import-export markets to make America richer while forcing international competitors to respect us and play by the rules of the free market. Bad trade deals like NAFTA are facing bitter pressure to be reformed to work for the American worker. Is President Trump determined to break his promise on amnesty, or is he trolling the already pressed Democrats?  

There cannot be another amnesty in this country, I don’t care how many sob stories the Nightmare Kids have rained down on Congressional offices, through the phone, or how hard they have campaigned throughout the year. The DACA recipients should never have happened. I have railed against the program from Day One. This brazen, political ploy shored up Obama’s re-election bid , and contorted Romney to make nice to Hispanic voters, yet at the same time pledged “Self-Deport” as the final immigration policy.

In mid-September, I visited 50 Congressional offices and 20 US Senators’ offices. I shared with them one horror story after another. Illegal aliens and their enabling hordes are overrunning California, and their fight to turn California into a race-bard third-world hell-hole won’t stop there.  Amnesty panderers and open border bigots call Americans “wetbacks.” Little children have been taught to hate “white people.”

A hostile, cultural takeover is infiltrating California, from school system to bureaucracy, and is now infecting Nevada, Arizona, and Texas. Even in Oregon, where I was celebrating Christmas with family, residents are frustrated about illegal immigration. Just like in California, Governor Kate Brown defied the President, the will of the people, and the Constitution of the United States by declaring Oregon a sanctuary state. This is untenable, folks, and we are approaching strife not seen since the Civil War in this country. In New York and California, Democratic governors have further defied the rule of law, granting pardons to illegals because of their unlawful status in the country. These acts of executive order virtue signaling will not succeed, since ICE is still scooping up illegals and deporting them. Any kind of amnesty hand out from Washington, however, will only embolden blue state governor’s adult-child social justice warrior micromanaging.

Every state has become a border state. The slow erosion of the nation’s sovereignty is killing us all, literally. Every time there is talk in Washington D.C. about granting legal status to illegal aliens, more illegals crowd our borders. More rapists, murderers, drug dealers crowd the border and surround our cities and towns. How many more friends, relatives, and fellow Americans will have to die?

No, Mr. President, a DACA “fix” will not be a fix, Mr. President. It will only affix the Democratic Party’s communistic agenda as a constant in this country. At least 50% of DACA recipients obtained permits through fraudulent means. There are at least 11 to 16 million illegals more in the country. There is nothing to prevent illegal aliens, once they achieve legal status, from bringing in five to ten more of their relatives each, many of whom are neither informed nor committed to the identity, vitality, or integrity of the United States.

The Republicans hold majorities in Congress and the Presidency. Why would they cave and give away their capital to renege on this precious promise of “no amnesty”. Sure, angry illegal alien mobs have overwhelmed Congressional offices and cafeterias; public streets and events. These atrocious behaviors prove they are losing this political fight. Nancy Pelosi promised a clean DREAM Act. Didn’t happen. Amnesty activist groups signaled to their followers that Congress voted to continue deporting “DREAMers”.

 Nonsense.  Congressional majorities voted to continue funding the government for We the People of the United States. That last part still bothers amnesty advocates. This is the United States, and the Constitution ensures protection for citizens, not illegal aliens. Republicans need to champion their populist-conservative, pro-American worker agenda, which includes disenfranchised blacks and Hispanics in California, Texas, and Arizona.

Did you know, Mr. President, that there are at least 20 Democrats who are worried about their re-election bids next year, not just the House Reps whose districts you won in 2016? The NRCC is targeting two seats in Oregon, for example, including my father’s House Rep. Peter De Fazio. This liberal Democrat is so spooked about the populist turn overtaking the country, he broke with his party and voted for Kate’s Law! Another Democrat on the south side of Chicago, Dan Lipinski, is facing a primary challenge from the left because he is *gasp* pro-life, pro-liberty, and opposes amnesty. Add to this strange cohort of anti-open border Democrats Zoe Lofgren of California, who has voted for more enforcement and against cheap labor VISA expansions. One of the most hateful, controversial Democrats in Congress, Sheila Jackson Lee, opposes guest worker programs!

Congressional Democrats are not unified on amnesty for the Nightmare Kids. US Senator Tom Cotton brilliantly surmised that DACA, DREAM Act, open border advocacy is not popular at all, or Democrats in both chambers of would have forced a government shut-down. This is further evidence that deep down, Democrats do not want to vote for amnesty, since Obama never preferred immigration reform when he controlled bother chambers of Congress in 2010. Before that, when Democrats had controlled Congress during the last wo years of George W. Bush’s term, more Democrats voted against an immigration reform package than Republicans!

Some pundits predict that a DACA deal will fail. Let’s hope so, and let’s hope that Trump is merely playing the Democrats—again. On immigration, Trump has the cards, and Republicans would be wrong to throw their hand away to make any kind of deal beyond what they promised to do.

Thank The Almighty Daily

A Celebration of Life

12/22/2017 - David Limbaugh Townhall.com

People often lament that in our celebration of Christmas, we tend to lose sight of its true meaning. Not to be a contrarian, but I don't think the two are mutually exclusive.

At Christmastime, we celebrate family, giving, tradition, friendship, community, love, goodwill and so much else that is great and good about human existence. These sublime experiences and institutions are wonderful precisely because our savior, in whom goodness inheres, created them.

With proper godly perspective, delighting in these glorious gifts actually enhances our focus on God; it doesn't diminish it. Of course, we must discipline ourselves, if it doesn't occur naturally, to give thanks to God and to consciously savor him and his gift of life to us.

This time of year, we celebrate Christ's incarnation -- his birth, his earthly example and his miracles and teachings. We humbly bow at the Crucifixion, marvel at the magisterial Resurrection and gratefully acknowledge our regeneration salvation in him. We cherish that he is truth, the judge and the very giver of life.

Unlike the mythical god of deism, our God did not create us and then callously abandon us to a desperate state of sinfulness, misery and suffering. He is not only the Creator but also the sustainer of the universe. The writer of Hebrews assures us, "He upholds the universe by the word of His power." The Apostle Paul proclaims, "He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together."

Though God gave us the freedom to sin and mankind subsequently fell, Christ became sin for us, thereby conquering sin and death. He offers us redemption and eternal life in his presence.

It is fitting that we celebrate Christ's birth, because his redeeming work on our behalf -- his death on the Cross and thus our salvation -- could not have been accomplished without his incarnation. It is all part of a piece. If he had merely been in form a human but in substance only God, his suffering, the Crucifixion and the Resurrection would have been illusory.

Paul wrote to the Philippians: "Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross."

Jesus wasn't just the greatest of all human prophets. He was fully God and fully man, a truth that Christians believed from the beginning and that the Council of Chalcedon formally affirmed in A.D. 451. "Therefore, following the holy fathers, we all with one accord teach men to acknowledge one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, at once complete in Godhead and complete in manhood, truly God and truly man, consisting also of a reasonable soul and body; of one substance with the Father as regards His Godhead, and at the same time of one substance with us as regards His manhood."

Christianity's critics sometimes question God's permitting human suffering, but the Cross, to paraphrase the late Pastor John Stott, smashes those concerns to smithereens. Christ understands our suffering and even our mundane problems because he became one of us and experienced what we experience. "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin" (Hebrews 4:15).

Christ suffered -- so that we can live -- more pain than anyone who has ever existed. It was not only his physical beatings and passion but also his excruciating separation from the Father and his endurance of God's wrath for all of the past, present and future sins of mankind. Moreover, God created us knowing at the time that Christ's human birth and sacrificial death would be necessary. John tells us that Jesus is "the Lamb that was slain from the creation of the world." A greater act of love is inconceivable.

Having become human and suffering as a human being, Christ is an empathetic, personal God, who is approachable to us and with whom we can have a personal relationship. "Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in the time of need" (Hebrews 4:16).

This Christmas, let's celebrate the wonders of our existence as human beings created in God's image and with the capacity for his love, which we must abundantly share with one another. Let's draw near to his throne of grace, profusely thanking him for the undeserved mercy he gave us and meditating on "whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable" (Philippians 4:8).

Wise Words From Tom Tancredo

You Think Russia Tries to Influence American Politics? Think Mexico First

 July 25, 2017 Tom Tancredo Breitbart.com

In 2002, I had an illuminating conversation in Mexico City with Juan Hernandez, a Texas-born dual citizen who served as head of the “Office of Mexicans Abroad” in the administration of Mexican President Vincente Fox. Hernandez bragged about Mexico’s policy for financing and distributing 200,000 “survival kits” for Mexican migrants seeking to enter the United States illegally. Years later the Texas Observer highlighted the episode as a key part of the Juan Hernandez legacy, along with his important role in John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign.

Hernandez explained that the policy of supporting illegal entry was only part of his efforts to greatly increase the number of Mexican nationals residing in the U.S. He was amazingly candid about the reasons. He said that first of all, the movement of millions of young, unemployed Mexicans across the southern border reduced the pressure they would otherwise be placing on the Mexican economy. Secondly, these folks would send home remittances and those dollars accounted for the second largest source of foreign income for the country. In 2016 Mexico received a record $26.8 billion in cash remittances. 

These remittances were so important to Mexico that Hernandez spent most of his time in the U.S. “working with the community” to maintain the migrants’ cultural ties to Mexico. The Mexican government recognized that if these migrants assimilated into the U.S. culture, the remittances would go down commensurately.

And finally, he told me that the other advantage Mexico gained by massive export of their population into the U.S. was the positive impact such a large population of Mexicans living here would have on our foreign policy towards Mexico. He could have added that that same population would put pressure on American politicians to relax efforts to secure the southern border or increase internal enforcement of immigration laws like the banning of sanctuary cities. 

Following that statement by Hernandez, I asked him, “Aren’t you embarrassed to admit such a thing, that your government is openly violating U.S. Sovereignty?” His reply opened my eyes to the scope of Mexican ambitions and their total disregard for U.S. law and international borders. Hernandez replied, “Really, congressman, we are talking here about a region, not two countries.”

Mexico has an embassy and 50 consulates located in 26 states, and over 35 million people residing in this country are of Mexican origin.

Mexico uses those 50 consulates to assist millions of illegal Mexicans in adapting to “life in the shadows.” Beginning around 2001, Mexico’s consulates started offering Matricula Consular identification cards to the millions of illegal Mexicans in the United States, ID cards that helped them get bank accounts, driver’s licenses and gain access to other public services.

A legal immigrant from Mexico has no need for that card, so it is a brazen program to facilitate illegal immigrants’ access to services and benefits normally reserved for legal residents. Needless to add, it also helps fortify the migrant’s ties to Mexico. In congressional testimony in 2003, the FBI called the cards a national security threat. 

Mexico is the second largest economy in Latin America, yet its economy has an unemployment rate more than triple that of the United States, it has experienced average GDP growth of only 1% annually over the past 20 years and has half its population living below the poverty line.

So, those remittance dollars flowing from its citizens in the U.S. are a pillar of stability and a prop for a failed socialist economy. It is in Mexico’s national interest to keep that Mexican population in the U.S. growing and those remittance dollars flowing.

Maximizing those goals requires our neighbor to pursue policies in direct opposition to U.S. immigration laws—and to praise American politicians who put illegal immigration ahead of the rule of law. And yet, miraculously, there has never been a congressional investigation of American politicians and government officials who routinely play ball (dare we call it “collusion”?) with that foreign government.

The point is, Mexico has values and interests separate and different from ours, so the perennial and continued interference in American politics through the encouragement of illegal immigration and other activities is rightfully a matter of serious concern. Moreover, we should remember that Mexico was annoyingly neutral in the Second World War — and for fifty years has been stridently pro-Castro in hemispheric politics.

I am not suggesting that Mexico poses an existential threat to American national security on the same level as the Soviet Union or the Russian Federation under the leadership of former KGB agent Vladimir Putin. Nonetheless, the fact remains that Mexico’s interests and American interests are far from identical and in fact frequently diverge. Colluding with the Mexican government or with organizations closely allied with Mexican goals and interests ought to be a subject of concern to the guardians of political probity.

So, let me ask: what is the difference between “collusion” and “collaboration,” or between “co-conspirator” and “partner.” Does it depend on whether you are plotting “demographic enhancement” or a Miss Universe Pageant?

House & Senate Leadership Refuses to Support Law Enforcement of Legislation

GOP Lawmaker Introduces Bill to Punish Officials Who Don't Enforce Immigration Laws

12/4/2017  - Lauretta Brown Townhall.com

Following Thursday’s not-guilty verdict in the Kate Steinle trial, Rep Todd Rokita (R-IN) introduced legislation Monday that would punish elected officials who refuse to enforce immigration laws with large fines and jail time.

Rokita’s “Stopping Lawless Actions of Politicians (SLAP) Act” targets state and local lawmakers who refuse to comply with federal immigration law and enforcement efforts with a $1 million fine and up to five years in prison if they are convicted.

“Politicians don’t get to pick and choose what laws to comply with,” Rokita told Fox News. “Americans are dying because politicians sworn to uphold the law refuse to do so.” 

“It’s time the federal government gets serious about enforcing immigration laws and holding politicians accountable who conspire to break them,” Rokita added.

Illegal immigrant Jose Ines Garcia Zarate was found not guilty of murder by a San Francisco court Thursday for the 2015 killing of 32-year-old Kate Steinle. Zarate was found guilty of a weapons charge and is once again being deported by U.S. immigration officials.

He had been deported back to Mexico several times prior to Steinle’s killing and has previous convictions for re-entry after deportation. Prior to Steinle’s shooting, Zarate had been released from a San Francisco jail following the dismissal of a minor drug charge. While U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had issued a detainer for him, he was released under San Francisco's sanctuary city laws.

Rokita also supports “Kate’s Law” – a bill, named after Steinle, that would increase penalties for illegal immigrants who were previously deported.

The mainstream media has largely ignored the shocking verdict which President Trump called “disgraceful.”

Diversity Lottery - Contributes to National Suicide

Still Dawdling Over Deadly Diversity Visas 

12/13/2017 - Michelle Malkin 

Capitol Hill's national security priorities are screwier than a Six Flags roller coaster.

Instead of immediately shutting down one of America's stupidest visa programs, which helped bring us yet another murder-minded jihadist this week, bipartisan Beltway politicians are pushing to preserve and expand the illegal immigration pipeline. Republicans and Democrats in Congress want a "fix" for the Obama administration's executive amnesty covering nearly 700,000 illegal immigrants -- and they want it pronto.

Translation: Protecting border-hopping "DREAMers" is a more important priority in Washington than protecting Americans from infiltrators exploiting the diversity visa lottery.

You remember the hew and cry over the diversity visa lottery, right? It was just seven short weeks ago when America discovered that New York City truck jihadist Sayfullo Saipov, who ruthlessly mowed down eight people on a bike path, had entered our country from Uzbekistan in 2010 by pure, random luck through the DV lottery program. President Donald Trump called on Congress to end it.

Saipov followed in the footsteps of Hesham Hadayet, the Egyptian-born LAX jihadist who gunned down two people at Israel's El Al airlines counter in 2002 and gained entry through his lottery-winning wife; Imran Mandhai, the Pakistan-born jihadist who plotted National Guard armory bombings in Florida and gained entry through his parents' lottery luck; Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev, another Uzbek jihadist and lottery winner convicted of supporting terrorism; Syed Ahmed, a Pakistan-born jihadist and DV recipient convicted of terrorism-related activities in the U.S. and abroad in 2009; and Mousa Mohammed Abu Marzook, a Hamas leader deported for terrorism activities in 1997 who had snagged a green card thanks to the DV lottery program's original iteration.

Up to 55,000 lucky winners a year have secured permanent residency visas (green cards) through the diversity visa lottery since 1990, which put them on the path to American citizenship ahead of millions of other foreigners patiently waiting to come to this country. The green card lotto winners' spouses and unmarried children under 21 all get lottery passes into the country, too, no matter where they were born. Chain migration extends the families' winnings. And so on, and so on, and so on.

As I've reported tirelessly since 9/11, when counterterrorism experts and immigration watchdogs united against the fraud-riddled, ill-conceived DV lottery, applicants don't even need a high school education. No outstanding abilities, training or job skills are necessary. Illegal aliens are eligible if a legal family member wins the jackpot. Tens of thousands are pouring in from terrorism breeding grounds through the lottery unvetted, unmonitored and unassimilated.

Justice Department investigators recently discovered one Somali woman who won the DV lottery and subsequently recruited an entire fake family, including a phony husband and two fictitious adult children, all of whom came to the United States and later gained U.S. citizenship based on their false claims.

A U.N. probe found human traffickers forcing dozens of diversity visa lottery winners into listing young female sex slaves as their "family members" to gain entry in the U.S.

And a State Department official testified in 2011 that in Bangladesh, "one agent is reported to have enrolled an entire phone book so that he could then either extort money from winning applicants who had never entered the program to begin with or sell their winning slots to others."

As usual, however, Congress has done precisely nothing to stop the ruinous racket created by the late Teddy Kennedy and signed off by President George H.W. Bush as a social engineering experiment to admit more "underrepresented" immigrant minorities into the U.S. The latest bill containing an end to the DV lottery program, the "RAISE Act," sponsored by Sens. Tom Cotton and David Perdue, is gathering dust. Sen. Chuck Grassley's latest call to the State Department for a "full-scale" review has yielded no movement.

And now, here we are, with yet another DV lottery beneficiary in custody for yet another jihad attack. Bangladeshi Akayed Ullah arrived here with a golden ticket obtained through a relative who won the visa lottery. Before strapping on his failed suicide vest on Monday in an attempt to inflict "maximum destruction" on commuters at the New York Port Authority bus terminal, Ullah was the minor child of a sibling of the original ticket holder, who became a naturalized U.S. citizen.

Seven weeks ago, Sen. Jeff Flake smugly tweeted to President Trump that the DV lottery program would have been killed if only the Gang of Eight illegal alien amnesty had been signed into law. In D.C., you see, stupid government programs will only die if hitched to even bigger, more reckless legislative abominations.

Washington priorities at work.

Legacy of Pearl Harbor Remembered

Pearl Harbor and the legacy of Carl Vinson

By Victor Davis Hanson www.Richmond.com

Seventy-six years ago — on Dec. 7, 1941 — the Imperial Japanese fleet surprise-attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, the home port of the U.S. Pacific Fleet. Japanese carrier planes killed 2,403 Americans. They sunk or submerged 19 ships (including eight battleships destroyed or disabled) and damaged or destroyed more than 300 planes.

In an amazing feat of seamanship, the huge Japanese carrier fleet had steamed nearly 3,500 miles in midwinter high seas. The armada had refueled more than 20 major ships while observing radio silence before arriving undetected about 220 miles from Hawaii.

The surprise attack started the Pacific War. It was followed a few hours later by a Japanese assault on the Philippines.

More importantly, Pearl Harbor ushered in a new phase of World War II, as the conflict expanded to the Pacific. It became a global war when, four days later, Germany and Italy declared war on the United States.

The Japanese fleet had missed the three absent American carriers of the Pacific Fleet. Nonetheless, Japanese admirals were certain that the United States was so crippled after the attack that it would not be able to go on the offensive against the Japanese Pacific empire for years, if at all. Surely the wounded Americans would sue for peace, or at least concentrate on Europe and keep out of the Japanese-held Pacific. That was a fatal miscalculation.

The Japanese warlords had known little of the tireless efforts of one Democratic congressman from Georgia, Carl Vinson.

For nearly a decade before Pearl Harbor, Vinson had schemed and politicked in brilliant fashion to ensure that America was building a two-ocean navy larger than all the major navies of the world combined.

Vinson had assumed in the mid-1930s that fascist Japan and Germany posed existential threats to the United States. For America to survive, he saw that America would need mastery of the seas to transport its armies across the Pacific and Atlantic.

From 1934 to 1940, Vinson pushed through Congress four major naval appropriations bills. The result was that the U.S. Pacific Fleet, which Japan thought it had almost destroyed in December 1941, was already slated to be replaced by a far larger and updated armada.

A little more than seven months after Pearl Harbor, the USS Essex — the finest carrier in the world — was launched. Essex was the first of 24 such state-of-the-art fleet carriers of its class to be built during the war.

Vinson’s various prewar naval construction bills also ensured the launching of hundreds of modern battleships, cruisers, destroyers and submarines. As bombs fell at Pearl Harbor, ships of the new American fleet were soon to be deployed, under construction, or already authorized.

Vinson’s foresight would save thousands of American lives in the Atlantic and Pacific. American naval power quickly allowed the U.S. to fight a two-front war against Japan, Germany, and Italy.

Vinson, a rural Georgian, was an unlikely advocate of global naval supremacy.

Before World War II, the battleship was still thought to be queen of the seas. Yet Vinson emphasized aircraft carriers over battleships. That decision would result in absolute American naval supremacy of the oceans within two years of the Pearl Harbor attack.

Stranger still, Vinson had fought for naval expansion in the middle of the Great Depression, at a time when the U.S. government was already deeply in debt and poor Americans had no desire for large peacetime defense spending.

Vinson lived in the heart of impoverished rural Georgia, not on the East or West coast, the traditional homes of U.S. warships. He was elected for 26 straight congressional terms. For 50 years, Vinson insisted on military preparedness, especially through naval power, to ensure deterrence and thereby keep the peace.

Vinson’s remarkable congressional career began in 1914, before the American entry into World War I. He championed a strong Navy during the Depression, World War II, the Korean War, the start of the Vietnam War, and the Cold War before retiring in 1965 at the age of 81.

Prior to Vinson, the U.S. Navy was basically a small coastal patrol force fueled by coal. But as the chairman of the House Naval Affairs Committee and later the House Armed Services Committee, Vinson ensured that American sea power — eventually led by behemoth nuclear-powered aircraft carriers (including the USS Carl Vinson) — would win wars and keep the peace through its global reach.

Vinson would live 16 years beyond retirement, dying at the age of 97 in 1981. Today, most Americans do not recognize Vinson’s contributions to American security. But the real strategic story of the December 7 attack on Pearl Harbor was that Japan foolishly bombed a mostly obsolete fleet, soon guaranteeing terrible revenge from its far greater and more modern replacement armada — thanks largely to the global visions of a rural Georgia congressman.

Sanctuary Cities - Example of Selective Law Enforcement

Sanctuary City Politics Killed Kate Steinle

12/5/2017 - John Kass Townhall.com

The photograph is of a lovely young woman, with a warm smile on her face, a woman who loved and was loved in turn.

Her name was Kate Steinle.

The last words she said to her father before she died were "Help me, Dad."

So look at that photo. See the promise in her face.

Some are calling her a symbol now of what's wrong with illegal immigration. I'm not so sure. My parents were immigrants.

I grew up in this country desperate to become an American. So immigration isn't some political exercise for me. It's been part of my life.

But so has been my understanding of what binds us together, all of us, so many different people, with our different ethnicities and habits and foods and languages.

It is the belief in the rule of law. And without that, we're nothing.

Making Kate Steinle a symbol doesn't do her justice. She wasn't a symbol of anything when that bullet took her. She was just a young American woman, walking with her dad.

When you look at the photo, you might want to fix the light of her eyes in your mind. But do it quickly, because Kate Steinle is in the way of politics, and she's fading from view.

She's being muscled out of the news.

The guilty plea of retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn in the Russia investigation of President Donald Trump's administration demands attention. The Republican tax cut demands attention.

And more allegations of sexual misconduct by political and media elites will get attention.

But before she fades from the news cycle, please consider this.

Kate Steinle isn't merely a casualty of a senseless act of some habitual criminal who was cleared of murder charges in San Francisco the other day.

Kate Steinle is a casualty of American politics, of sanctuary city politics.

And that makes her a political problem. That makes her an irritant to Democratic politicians and the open-borders types who use sanctuary city policies to bend immigration law and win Mexican-American votes.

You might not like it, but that's what it is. They defy federal law to satisfy their local politics.

So yes, she's a problem, because it was sanctuary city policy that protected Jose Zarate, a career criminal who had already been deported five times and was in this country illegally.

Zarate had been in local custody on a drug charge. And rather than bow to a detainer request of federal immigration authorities and hold him, Sanctuary San Francisco let Jose Zarate go.

There was a stolen gun in his hand as Kate Steinle and her father walked along Pier 14.

He initially told police he'd been shooting at a sea lion.

But if he had killed the sea lion, Zarate would have been convicted of something.

The bullet killed Kate Steinle instead. And a jury acquitted him of all the serious charges, from murder to manslaughter.

A charge of murder requires proof of direct intent and there were no witnesses to intent. I've seen it argued that local prosecutors overreached in charging murder in the first degree. I wouldn't disagree.

Yet he also walked on manslaughter charges. And how a man can fire a gun and kill someone and not be convicted of manslaughter? That is beyond me.

I wasn't in that courtroom. Her family was, though. And her father, Jim Steinle, told the San Francisco Chronicle that the family was shocked and saddened by the verdict.

"There's no other way you can join it. Justice was rendered, but it was not served," he said.

And justice still isn't being served, as long as sanctuary cities allow local political warlords to buy votes by bending federal law.

The politics of this are smart, and effective, which is why so many big cities with large Mexican populations have adopted sanctuary city policies.

But under the law, immigration is the province of the federal government. And without the law, what are we? A collection of squabbling city-states?

Why do we even have a federal government at all, if only to allow each state, each city and the local warlords to make their own separate immigration policy?

Only the people of a sovereign nation have the right to decide what to do about their own borders. And their will is expressed by Congress.

A nation without borders isn't a nation. It's just land that can be grabbed by whoever is tough enough to grab it. And releasing criminals onto the streets to satisfy your political goals isn't policy. It's dangerous.

But all that wasn't on the mind of Jim Steinle or his daughter Kate when they were walking along that San Francisco pier.

"Kate was beautiful, kind, happy, caring, loving and deep in faith," Jim Steinle said in testifying before Congress in 2015. "Kate had a special soul, a kind and giving heart, the most contagious laugh, and a smile that would light up a room.

"... The day she was killed, we were walking arm in arm on Pier 14 in San Francisco, enjoying a wonderful day together. Suddenly a shot rang out, Kate fell, and looked at me and said, 'Help me, Dad.' Those are the last words I will ever hear from my daughter," he said.

In America, we say that justice is blind because we know that without justice under the rule of law, we're finished.

What happened to Kate Steinle wasn't justice.

A bullet took her life. But it was politics that killed her.